The Detroit Lions have released their inactives ahead of their Week 17 game against the San Francisco 49ers. Who’s in, and who’s out?
The Detroit Lions (13-2) have declared their inactives ahead of the Week 17 “Monday Night Football” matchup with the San Francisco 49ers (6-9).
One of the more interesting moves the Lions made this past week was to re-sign quarterback Teddy Bridgewater . Not only does Bridgewater give the Lions valuable veteran depth at the most important position on the football field, as well as a positive leader in the locker room, he also gives the Lions the ability to utilize the “emergency third quarterback rule” — a rule change that was proposed by the Lions and adopted into the NFL in 2023.
Basically, the rule allows NFL teams with three quarterbacks on the active roster (like the Lions) to designate one of them as the “emergency quarterback” and that player will count toward the team’s inactives list for the game. The player listed as the “emergency quarterback” is only eligible to play, in a situation where both “game-day active quarterbacks” were ruled unavailable due to injury. If it seems like a rule teams would rarely put into practice, you’d be correct, but it has happened before, the most recent case being (ironically) the 49ers in the 2023 playoffs.
So for tonight’s game, and likely the upcoming playoffs, look for the Lions to designate an “emergency third quarterback,” as a just-in-case backup plan.
If you missed moves, or need a refresher, make sure and check out our updated depth chart , with position-by-position rankings as well as a visual overview.
For this week’s game, because the Lions have eight offensive linemen active for Sunday’s game, they are eligible to expand their game-day roster from 47 to 48 players. Therefore, with 55 players on the game-day roster and 48 eligible to play, the Lions need to declare just seven players inactive for today’s matchup.
Lions inactives:
- QB Teddy Bridgewater — Emergency third quarterback
- RB David Montgomery (knee) — Ruled OUT Saturday
- OG Kayode Awosika
- OL Colby Sorsdal
- OL Giovanni Manu
- DL Brodric Martin
- DL Jonah Williams
49ers inactives:
- QB Brandon Allen
- RB Israel Abanikanda
- OL Spencer Burford (calf)
- DL Khalil Davis
- EDGE Robert Beal (ankle)
- LB Dre Greenlaw (calf)
- CB Charvarius Ward (personal)